We Drove an Hour North of Sydney and Found Lions at a Farm
A day trip review of Amazement Farm & Fun Park at Wyong Creek, where a petting farm somehow turns into a zoo halfway through
I’ll be honest, when a friend told me there was a farm on the Central Coast with actual lions in it, I laughed and told her she was exaggerating. Farms have chickens. Farms have goats. Farms do not have lions. So of course the next long weekend we packed the car, pointed it up the M1, and went to see for ourselves.
The place is called Amazement Farm & Fun Park, and it’s out at Wyong Creek, a little over an hour’s drive from Sydney if the traffic behaves itself. The drive alone is nice, you leave the motorway and wind through some genuinely pretty Central Coast countryside for the last ten minutes or so, past paddocks and creek crossings, which is a good sign you’re somewhere properly rural and not just a theme park with a farm sticker slapped on it.
Meeting the Farm Animals
We rolled in not long after opening and the first thing that hit us was the noise. A rooster was strutting around like he owned the place, crowing at absolutely nothing, and a peacock had his tail fanned out near the entrance putting on a show for anyone who’d look. My daughter was already gone, chasing feathers before we’d even bought a ticket. A few dollars gets you a little bag of feed pellets at the gate, and that’s really where the morning starts, because there’s an alpaca and a black swan and a couple of enormous ostriches all fully expecting you to hand it over.
What I didn’t expect was how much closer we’d get than at a normal petting zoo. There are proper animal encounters here, koalas, snakes, kangaroos, the kind of close-up interaction and photo you’d usually pay zoo prices for, and each one runs somewhere around fifteen dollars on top of your general admission. It’s not cheap exactly, but compared to what we’ve paid at bigger wildlife parks, it felt fair.
The Lions No One Warned Us About
And then we turned a corner and there they were. Actual lions. It turns out Amazement Farm shares its grounds with Central Coast Zoo, which has been slowly opening up alongside the original farm, and that’s where the more exotic residents live, penguins included. It’s genuinely strange watching your kid go from bottle-feeding a lamb to standing in front of a lion enclosure within the same half hour, but that contrast is honestly what makes the place memorable. You come for the farm and leave having also seen a zoo.
The Rest of the Day
The rest of the day filled itself in easily. There’s a little train that loops around the property and it’s included free with your entry, which the kids treated like a full ride even though it only takes a few minutes. There’s a maze that took us a solid twenty minutes to get out of, mostly because my husband refused to admit he was lost. A playground kept the littlest one busy while we had a coffee at the on-site cafe, though plenty of families around us had brought their own lunch and set up on the picnic tables instead, which looked like the smarter move given how good the weather was.
If you’re planning your own visit, it pays to grab the daily timetable when you walk in and build your day around it, the petting sessions and shows run at set times and we nearly missed one because we got distracted by the maze. We didn’t leave until closing, and even then it felt like there was more we hadn’t got to.
Good to Know Before You Go
A few practical bits worth knowing before you go. The farm is open every day from 9:30am to 4pm, with last entry at 3pm, and it’s closed on Christmas Day. Adult tickets are $38 if you book online (a bit more at the gate), kids are $26, and there’s a family pass that works out cheaper if there are four of you. The animal encounters need a valid general admission ticket as well, so factor that into your budget if you want the koala photo. It’s at 170 Yarramalong Rd, Wyong Creek, easy enough to punch into the GPS, and honestly, wear a hat, there’s very little shade once you’re out among the animal yards.
More Day Trips Like This One
If you’re after more animal-farm day trips within striking distance of Sydney, we’ve rounded up some other favourites in our guide to the best animal farms around Sydney, and if alpacas are more your speed there’s also the best alpaca farms near Sydney. Trying to work out which school holiday break to use for a trip like this? Our NSW school holidays 2026 dates are all laid out to help you plan around it.
Ticket prices, hours and admission details above are current as of the Amazement Farm & Fun Park official website at time of writing, but it’s always worth double-checking before you go since these things do change.